


Observations on the Weaknesses of Tenno Skoom

by HopeStoryteller



Category: Warframe
Genre: But That's Just My Headcanon, Gen, Kela's ex may or may not be Cressa Tal, this tenno isn't mine! but she's adorable!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:07:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22355350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopeStoryteller/pseuds/HopeStoryteller
Summary: Meet Festa: literal ray of sunshine, Tenno without a Warframe, and diehard Grineer loyalist. Yes, you read that last part right.Alternate title: local Tenno that doesn't know she's a Tenno is very loyal to the Queens. People who actually know the Queens are slightly worried about this.
Comments: 22
Kudos: 33





	Observations on the Weaknesses of Tenno Skoom

Drip. Drip. Drip.

For all her enthusiasm, Festa is good at being quiet. Not that she really  _ needs _ to be, of course—Tenno skoom might be dangerous monsters but they’re also very loud monsters. Even if they weren’t, Festa’s good at disappearing when she wants to. And observing. Which she has to be, if she’s going to be a scientist and figure out their weaknesses!

The Tenno she’s watching now is visibly and audibly dripping, having just climbed out of the water. Their archwing folds out of sight. They shake like a big drahk before retrieving their bow and running off to who knows where. Maybe their extraction point, but Festa knows what that will look like. She doesn’t follow them. This time, anyway.

She hums to herself cheerfully, and scrawls some notes on her tablet. She takes a sip of her drink, opens a new document, and keeps writing. She doesn’t even realize the Tenno is gone (are gone? There could be multiple, although she’s only seen one today) until someone clears his throat.

She glances up. Grins.

“Hi!” Festa says brightly.

The scientist known throughout the system as Tyl Regor, brilliant and feared by enemies of the Grineer everywhere, chuckles warmly. He sets down the oxygen tank he’d been carrying, gets down on his knees, and is promptly hugged.

“Hello, little one,” the feared and loathed Tyl Regor greets warmly. “How are your observations going?”

Festa turns her tablet to show him, forgetting in her excitement that she’s one of approximately five people in the system unaffliliated with the Tenno who can read and write Orokin script. On the bright side, she’s provided diagrams, but without color or readable labels it’s difficult to tell  _ what _ exactly that is beside a warframe doing… something.

Tyl strokes the bottom of his mask in a way that approximates stroking one’s chin and says, thoughtfully, “I see.”

He does not see. He is, sadly, not one of the approximately five people in the system unaffliliated with the Tenno who can read and write Orokin script.

“How did you determine this?” He asks after a long moment.

Festa hasn’t stopped grinning since he showed up. “Okay, so! We know that the Tenno skoom utilize archwings for both spaceflight and underwater operations. Space travel makes sense—otherwise, turning off life support wouldn’t work on them, and only a few of their warframes can fly without the aid of those archwings. But Dad, Dad,  _ listen _ . While in some cases I’m sure they use them just to go faster underwater, here on Uranus especially they use them in tight spaces underwater where they really shouldn’t.”

She gets a nod and continues, triumphantly, “I think Tenno skoom can’t swim! Of course they’re biomachines, but that means they have the weaknesses of both biological organisms  _ and _ machines. Archwings are built to support oxygen breathers in space, like galleons but on a much,  _ much _ smaller scale. If they can support skoom in space, where they don’t belong, they can support skoom in other environments where they normally wouldn’t be capable of going.”

“I prefer calling them jellyfish myself, but please continue.”

“Jellyfish? Alright Dad. Just for you!” 

She clears her throat, reaches for her drink, and takes another sip before continuing. On Uranus, water  _ isn’t _ rationed and therefore the tastier stuff isn’t either. Part of why she likes it here, if not the major part.

“So: while it would take a significant amount of testing on warframes we don’t have to confirm whether or not Tenno...  _ jellyfish _ are incapable of swimming, with archwings they don’t need to, so it’s entirely possible they don’t even know how!” 

“Fascinating. You are  _ well _ on your way to becoming a true Grineer scientist, little one.”

He reaches out to muss her hair some. Preliminary experiments had shown that she liked that, and the current one does nothing to disprove that. Festa laughs merrily. She grabs her stuff, slides it back in her bag, and straightens up again.

“The Tenno sk—jellyfish won’t know what hit them once I’m a scientist!” She declares, before frowning. “What’s a jellyfish, anyway?”

“I’m glad you asked. Do walk with me a moment.” He waits until they’re a significant distance along the corridor before continuing, “A jellyfish was a fabled Earthen creature, capable of growing to immense size and subduing even the toughest foes from one… little…  _ sting! _ ”

He pokes her in the shoulder. Festa laughs, and pokes him back. It’s times like these that Tyl Regor, feared and loathed across the system, is convinced he’s doing the right thing by keeping her from the Queens just a little while longer.

(“We can’t keep this… child hidden forever.” Kela’s words echo in memory, unbidden and unwanted. “But  _ fine _ . You can send her to me when your laboratories are under inspection. How long are you going to keep her?”)

“However long she needs,” Tyl murmurs under his breath, recalling his own reply in the present.

“What was that?”

Festa’s skipped ahead some, but apparently heard him say something and doubled back. Just not the specifics—thank the Queens, and he’s well aware of the irony of that thought. He also suspects he’s well aware of what will happen when the Queens find out.

In retrospect, he doesn’t know why he’s doing this. Except he does, when he remembers the tubemen. His tubemen, his  _ children. _ Festa is, in her own way, one of his tubemen herself.

He won’t let her go the same way as the others. Not if there’s anything he can do to prevent it, anything at all. But it won’t do to dwell on such negative thoughts, not when such a bright and positive, and more importantly young and impressionable, child is right here with him.

He chuckles. 

“Jellyfish,” he says in way of explanation. It’s not an explanation at all, but it’s the beginning of one. “Once, they filled the oceans of Earth. Now, they are nowhere to be found. Perhaps they never existed. Or perhaps, they were all killed. If monstrosities like jellyfish can be eradicated, so too can the Tenno.”

“Jellyfish actually existed,” Festa repeats. Apparently that’s her takeaway from his spiel. “Do you have a picture anywhere?”

Tyl Regor does not have a picture of jellyfish anywhere, nor is he completely sure where he would go about finding one. However, far be it from him to crush her hopes with such a little thing.

“I will look for one, while  _ you _ are staying with Auntie Kela,” Tyl tells her. Her face falls. “Don’t you like Auntie Kela?”

“Of course I do! Auntie Kela’s  _ great _ , she taught me how to use her  _ cannon! _ But…” Festa takes a deep breath, lets it out, and turns on him with wide, watery eyes. “How am I ever going to prove myself to the Queens if I’m with Auntie Kela whenever their inspection is here?”

_ No, absolutely not, never, _ he wants to say. His loyalty is, of course to the Queens and always will be, as is that of Kela de Thaym. But…

“You’re not  _ quite _ ready to meet them yet,” Tyl says in a far lighter tone than he wants to. “When you are, you’ll be here to meet them.”

Festa gasps. Her grin returns in full force. “I  _ will?? _ ”

“You will.”

“Okay! How do I get ready?”

“You take this transport to Sedna, and you stay with Auntie Kela until the inspection is over. Then…” Tyl makes a show of thinking, strokes his chin thoughtfully. “Then, I’ll tell you when you’re ready.”

He gets her on the transport and well on her way to Sedna by the time the Queens’ inspector arrives. Nothing is found out of order, and nothing will be found out of order.

Still, Tyl can’t help but hope, thoroughly foolish and illogical as it is, that Festa is never ready to meet the Queens.

* * *

Kela likes this kid, and she wouldn’t think that lightly. Festa’s passionate, enthusiastic, and while she’s too small to effectively wield a rocket launcher, she makes up for it with more energy than some of Kela’s executioners. She almost reminds her of herself, fresh out of the tubes and all raring to rip all who defied the Queens to bloody shreds.

That last bit hasn’t changed much, which is why Festa, enthusiastic and loyal as she is, is a problem. There has to be some reason  _ why _ Tyl Regor is so insistent that the Queens not find out about her, and while he otherwise gives no one any reason to question his loyalty… Kela wonders. 

But not for long, because she didn’t become  _ the _ Kela De Thaym by wasting time wondering. She makes her decisions, what few are indeed her own and not orders from the Queens, and she stands by them. And she’s made her decision on this. 

“Al _ right _ , kid,” Kela says, “you’re short. But you know what the thing about weapons is?”

“No,” Festa says cheerfully, like she hasn’t heard this at least twice already. “What?!”

“What it  _ is _ , is: a good weapon can  _ more _ than make up for being small in size. Especially if you mod it well. You mod a regular, shitty weapon well, you’ll be able to handle a lot. You mod a good weapon well, you can even handle  _ Tenno skoom. _ ”

“Wow.” Festa sucks in a breath as Kela passes her an old Hek. She peers at it curiously, then looks up at Kela and asks, “Is this a good weapon? Can I use it? How do I use it?”

“Yes, that’s the entire point of giving it to you here, and you start by not pointing a weapon at anything you would miss if it misfired.” Kela pushes the dangerous end of the Hek off to the side, safely aimed away from both her and the kid. “First, you’re going to learn weapon safety.”

“Okay!” 

Kela did just go on about the importance of good mods. However, she also would rather  _ not _ have to get bits replaced when she just did last week, so for the time being (read: until Festa knows how to safely operate a Hek, or any weapon for that matter) this particular Hek is unmodded and going to stay that way. Likely for some time, because whatever Festa is, however enthusiastic she is about the Grineer, she clearly wasn’t born Grineer. There  _ aren’t _ any Grineer children, despite what Tyl Regor seems to believe.

So it’ll take her some time to learn.

But what the hell. Kela doesn’t mind teaching Festa to shoot if it means she has someone to do target practice with. And unlike a certain someone else, Festa won’t leave her for  _ Steel Meridian. _

“First rule of weapon safety: always,  _ always _ treat it like it’s loaded and could go off at any time. Even if it has a safety mechanism to keep from friendly fire, which the vast majority of our weapons don’t because for some reason, the Queens think your everyday Lancer is smart enough not to accidentally fire on other Grineer. Even if you’re positive it’s unloaded, treat it like it is.”

Festa nods vigorously. “First rule, got it. The next one?”

“The second rule is to never point your weapon at anything you aren’t willing to destroy. That includes me, although it would take more than one shot to bring  _ the _ Kela De Thaym down.” Festa hastily points the Hek back at the floor, grins sheepishly. “Third rule: keep your finger off the trigger until you’re ready to shoot. Don’t want to waste ammo shooting at the floor.”

“Got it! Anything else?”

Well, there  _ are _ other rules that Kela herself goes by, but most other Grineer don’t and Festa should be alright with just the three for now. Besides, she’s clearly excited to start shooting. Kela can’t blame her for that.

“Later. It’s time to start shooting.”

One of the perks of being the Kela De Thaym: just off her quarters is a private room for target practice, which means nobody will see Festa with her.

**Author's Note:**

> Festa is [valledamoth's](https://twitter.com/valledamoth1) character! And honestly, Festa is great, I had a great time writing her. :D ~~Even if I'm slightly worried about her future.~~


End file.
